A bicycle car rack is a common means of transporting bicycles on a vehicle. Typically, such racks utilize the vehicle's existing trailer hitch receiver as an attachment point. Such known standard racks properly support a “man's” bike, with the horizontal cross bar from the seat post to the handlebar stem, providing safety and convenience for the rider. However, known racks do not properly support a “girl's” or “lady's” bike, which do not have the horizontal cross bar, but rather a double parallel tube design to provide the needed strength for the frame. Known racks also do not properly support “unisex” bikes, which not have a horizontal crossbar but a higher parallel tube design between the traditional “man's” and “lady's” styles. The design of the “lady's” and “unisex” bikes do not allow the bike to properly hang from the traditional bike rack which generally employs some sort of double hook arrangement.
As bicycles, other than the traditional “man's” bike, do not have horizontal cross bars, such bicycles can present safety issues when trying to carry them on known traditional vehicle mounted bike racks, which are primarily designed to engage such horizontal cross bars. Because such bicycles do not have the horizontal cross bars, the bicycles may be mounted off center to the vehicle, causing a tire to extend beyond the side of the vehicle. Consequently, the driver of such vehicle might misjudge clearance of the vehicle and bicycle, which could result in the bicycle being knocked off of the bike rack. In addition, a pedestrian or another vehicle could be hit by the bike, causing an accident or injury.
In addition, bicycles which do not have horizontal cross bars generally are mounted on known bike racks in a non-level position. Consequently, at least one wheel of the bicycle is positioned closer to the ground. In smaller vehicles, such as economy and sports cars, which have less height than other vehicles, the lack of ground clearance of the wheel can pose a safety concern, as the wheel might well be dragging on the road surface or at least not far from it.
It would, therefore, be beneficial to provide a bicycle mount device and method which positions, secures and maintains a bicycle in a level position during transport. In addition, it would be beneficial to maintain the bicycle at a convenient height to ensure that the bicycle wheels are positioned safely above the ground for proper transport on the carrier.